Patron Group: Engineering plant chassis for natural product biosynthesis
Supervisor:
Dr Nicola Patron
Background:
Many plants produce bioactive metabolites with properties that are of interest to health, agriculture or industry. However, these molecules sometimes occur in complex mixtures or within a limited number of cell types reducing accessibility. Furthermore, complex stereochemistry can limit the feasibility of chemical synthesis. Consequently, global demands for certain plant natural products can place unsustainable pressure on the species in which they occur.
Importance of Research:
Reconstruction of plant metabolic pathways in heterologous hosts provides an alternative route for accessing rare plant natural products. Metabolic engineering can be applied to obtain high yields of target molecules, providing new and more sustainable routes to access. It can also be used to combine enzymes from different species into novel pathways and produce new-to-nature molecules.
Project Summary:
Photosynthetic chassis, including plants, provide particular advantages as production chassis, including accessibility to metabolic precursors derived from the products of photosynthesis and multiple subcellular compartments. Further, most plant enzymes are functional when heterologously expressed in another plant. To date, just a few plants have been explored in detail, most notably Nicotiana benthamiana. While this species has several advantages, aspects of its endogenous biology can limit the yield and purity of target molecules. This project will assess and engineer alternative plant platforms with a focus on the potential for low-cost scalability.
What will the successful applicant do?
Using a synthetic biology approach, the student will assemble synthetic genetic pathways for key classes of useful metabolites and compare the potential of novel production chassis. They will investigate methods for circuit delivery and use genome editing and metabolic engineering to tailor bioproduction. This project will provide training across molecular biology, cell biology, plant biotechnology and biochemistry and is suited to students with interests that span discovery and innovation.